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Author Archives: Sabrina I. Pacifici

TSA confirms plans to mandate mug shots for domestic air travel

Papers Please: “In an on-stage interview [March 14, 2023] at South By Southwest by a reporter for the Dallas Morning News, the head of the US Transportation Security Administration made explicit that the TSA plans to make collection of biometric data mandatory for airline travel: According to a report in [March 15, 2023] of the… Continue Reading

Popular Political Podcasts Dataset

The Popular Political Podcast Dataset developed by Valerie Wirtschafter and Chris Meserole at the Brookings Institution: “Podcasts have exploded in popularity recently. Over the past decade, monthly podcast listeners have risen from just over 10% of the U.S. population to more than 40%—a reach on par with major social media platforms like Instagram. Yet for… Continue Reading

Republican Rep. Jim Jordan Issues Sweeping Subpoenas to Universities Studying Misinformation

Pro Publica: “In the subpoenas, Jordan asserted that the schools may have contributed to the Biden administration’s “censorship regime by advising on so-called misinformation. House Republicans have sent letters to at least three universities and a think tank requesting a broad range of documents related to what it says are the institutions’ contributions to the… Continue Reading

Incorporating AI-Powered Chatbots into Legal Research Exercises and Assignments

RIPS Law Librarian: Oh No, Another ChatGPT Post: Incorporating AI-Powered Chatbots into Legal Research Exercises and Assignments – Olivia Smith Schlinck – “Since it was launched at the end of November 2022, the discourse around ChatGPT and AI search tools has been unrelenting. What impact will AI-powered chatbots have on education? Will students submit ChatGPT-written essays and… Continue Reading

Civilian Harm in Ukraine – Russia’s Assault on Daily Life in Ukraine

Bellingcat – map and dataset of 1,000+ incidents [includes incident’s date, location, description, sources, type of area affected, and type of weapon system]: “This map plots out and highlights incidents that have resulted in potential civilian impact or harm since Russia began its invasion of Ukraine. The incidents detailed have been collected by Bellingcat researchers.… Continue Reading

Google’s Bard lags behind GPT-4 and Claude in head-to-head comparison

TechCrunch: “Google has taken the wraps off Bard, its conversational AI meant to compete with ChatGPT and other large language models. But after its shaky debut, users may understandably be a bit wary of trusting the system — so we compared it on a few example prompts with its AI peers, GPT-4 and Claude. This… Continue Reading

ChatGPT comes for radio

The Verge: “It’s been pretty slow in the audio world for the past few weeks — except when it comes to AI, which seems to be progressing at a clip.  Today, ChatGPT comes to radio, NPR employees prepare for layoffs, and Spotify expands its audiobook business….RadioGPT makes it easy to replace human DJs with bots.… Continue Reading

World Happiness Report 2023

“It has been over ten years since the first World Happiness Report was published. And it is exactly ten years since the United Nations General Assembly adopted Resolution 66/281, proclaiming 20 March to be observed annually as International Day of Happiness. Since then, more and more people have come to believe that our success as… Continue Reading

Visualizing the Arrival of Spring

Washington Post: “When will spring come? Or has it already? Look up where you live. All across the east, naturalists are exasperated. As the rest of us luxuriated in this winter’s uncommon mildness, gardeners and wildlife biologists watched with rising pique as one of the earliest springs in recent memory threw nature’s rhythms out of… Continue Reading

LinkedIn Releases New AI Tool to Help Create Your Profile

Gizmodo: “LinkedIn is using generative AI to simplify the process of writing job listings, filling out resumes, and updating your profile, the company announced on Wednesday. The new feature will be similar to ChatGPT and the company said in a press release that it will “unlock opportunities” and “elevate your career.” The AI option will… Continue Reading

Understanding Antisemitism on Twitter After Musk

“New research from CASM Technology and ISD has found a major and sustained spike in antisemitic posts on Twitter since the company’s takeover by Elon Musk on October 27, 2022. Powered by the award-winning digital analysis technology Beam – and based on a powerful hate speech detection methodology combining over twenty leading machine-learning models –… Continue Reading